Force Redux

@Graedyn thanks for the compliment, glad folks find it useful 🙂

Also, ty for the compliment on my Dark thread 😀

The most important aspect is the resistance debuff which any of the three can give you. Demons kill things quickly enough that the only thing you care about debuffing resistance on is single tough targets like EBs or AVs, where you can help stack -Res with your Demons. Corruption works best IMO. Plus I like the range and speed. I don't care for the knockback/KD on on either Lash or Crack Whip. Stick an Overwhelming Force KD proc in T1 Demonlings and it's very noticable CC in their place. These are quibbles, however. Pick one you enjoy the animation on and use it, if you are otherwise undecided 😊

Thugs are more damage oriented. Necro trades some damage for control. Both are great. I personally like Necro better between the two. If I want damage I go Beast or Demons. I have a recent post with advice for Necro/Nature...

My Beast/Time is ..well...a beast! 😀 I also would recommend Beast/Dark. Both are excellent secondaries that offer very different play styles!

Yes, only available on the Thunderspy server, and even then it required some jury rigging...

Glad you're enjoying the game, and welcome to Paragon, hero! MMs funny really come into they're own until starting in the mid 20s. They really blossom with slotting and also the final upgrade at 32. I personally would not go with Fighting Pool for attacks. But the nice thing about CoH is that almost anything will work at varying levels of effectiveness. Since you're not worried about end game, you don't have to be optimal. But it should be fun. I would strongly recommend the Beast attacks, Call Hawk and Call Ravens in particular. They will do more for you than Punch or Kick. If you want another set with fun attacks to use, try Demons. The whips animate well and are useful.

Just because I'm a nerd, I'll chime on this one. Couple of suggestions 😄 Tier 1 (Summon Adventurer) Archer, Archer and Rogue (Rogue is a stalker with dual blades) Tier 2 (Summon Warriors) Knight and Paladin (Knight specializes in buff auras, Paladin has heal auras) Tier 3 (Summon Warlock) Warlock (mix of damage and some control, ala Demon Prince)

As a Redsider, this pleases me! 😎

It's all fun and games until someone sends in killer clowns from outer space 😳😀

Once you are properly slotted you should not be having any endurance issues. Feel free to post a build review. I would never consider getting rid of darkest night it may not see regular use when you get to higher levels but when you face a tough boss or arch villain you'll be glad you had it.

Looking forward to more 🙂👍🏻

@TK3477 Well, here's my build. Goals: Keep Chill Mastery since you wanted Defense Armor without the flavor of Mace. WIth the build, you sit at 43.4% S/L Defense and 28% S/L Resistance (including Wild Growth buff). While you are not tankerminding, since you are using Entangling Aura you will catch some aggro and you will be closer to melee, so this is a good pairing with S/L Defense. Get Global Recharge higher. I added Hasten. So many of Nature's buffs rely on good recharge, this was low-hanging fruit. Also LotGs where possible. Use Procs to help the pets. Zombies have Overwhelming KD to help with mitigation. It will go off often. Grave Knights have Lady Gray and to help bring down targets faster. This and their innate Knockup will help with mitigation. Lich - not slotted for Maximizing -ToHit (as I would with a /Dark build), but will contribute to damage with the Clouded Senses proc. Squeeze in some +hit point bonuses when possible. Since your Wild Bastion is based on Max Health. Accolades will also go a long way to helping boost this power. I got rid of Fighting and achieved similar results with IOs. Since you are not tankerminding the extra S/L Resists are wasted. Even on my few tanker mind builds I never took Fighting. I removed Drain Life. You already have a number of healing sources, and if you want a damage power, Gloom is the standout for Necromancy. Unfortunately, I did not have room for it and there are more important powers to take during the leveling process. I'd grab two attack powers from the P2W vendor such as the Blackwand (thematic, and helpful debuff), Undead Slaying Axe, and/or Sands of Mu and supplement it with some temporary powers you can purchase, such as Envenomed Dagger and Gabriel's Hammer (cheaper than Dagger, without the debuff). That way you can do something attack-y-ish if you like. Remember, you have the Kismet +Acc IO and Tactics plus some accuracy bonuses to help land these powers, even if you can't slot them. Or you could forgo a little bit of S/L Defense and trade out Flash Freeze for Gloom. Don't' get Ice Blast, its terrible numbers wise, you don't have enough slows to stack to make it effective for that purpose, and it really only matters if you take it for theme. (I did for my Robots/Cold/Chill MM, and that's okay). Added Speed for Hasten (see above) and Super Speed (with celerity Stealth IO) so you can ghost your Dark Astoria missions or use Assemble the Team/Incandescence on speed TFs. Kept Leadership - of course, the backbone of good MM support for pets and teams. Replaced Sorcery with Flight. IMO one goes for the Sorcery Pool either for theme or for specific powers. You had it only for travel. You can easily change this back, but I really advocate for Group Fly for any Mastermind to help with tactical management of pet AI on Z-axis maps. This is not a movement power per se, but a positioning power for quality of life. You also get another mule for LotG in Afterburner, which has its uses on large maps, too. Fly can hold the helpful Winter's Gift slow/rcharge resist IO. Considering how much Nature relies on good recharge, this is to the build's benefit. Doctor's Wounds sets are in place for the beneficial 5% recharge boost. I put a +END Proc in Lifegiving Spores, as it will proc for anyone standing in the field. Enchant Undead and Dark Empowerment never need more than one slot, ever, for EndRedux. Slots are too precious. Bump them to 50+5 if you want to spend the funds on a small extra bit of cost, but do not double slot these. Even if you resummon in battle, stand in your Lifegiving Spores and that will be more beneficial. Additionally, carry a few extra blues in your Insp tray. But if you get your Accolades and use Lifegiving Spores, you won't worry about resummoning costs to much in battle, even the worst ones. I slotted Basilisk's Gaze into Entangling Aura** for a nice 7.5% recharge boost. I'm a fan of Entangling Aura and it really helps reliably keep minions in place. With the Lockdown Proc it can help pin down Lts and occasionally Bosses as well (but the bosses will only be intermittent). Because this build uses Chill Mastery and you can't tell when Lich will use Tenebrous Tentacles, having Engangling Aura to prevent mob movement is super important. If you do direct Lich to attack a boss, you will more reliably hold him due to Lich adding his hold. If you decide to go the Controller approach with Lich instead of damage, you can substitute the Clouded Senses proc for a Hamidon Acc/Mezz (don't do Dam/Mezz, as you're already at diminishing returns on Damage, so extra Acc at least isnt wasted). **I slotted an Acc/Hold in Basiliksk's Gaze, as Entangling Aura power description does have a base accuracy of 1.0; however, it does not take Accuracy enhancers, which has led me to believe it is auto-hit. I never removed the Acc/Hold in my live build, it works just fine, but assuming it doesn't need Acc, you could always swap this for Rech/Hold in case you want to get it up quicker after detoggling. I wouldn't bother with the % recharge slow IO, it doesn't seem to really help any time I've used it. Soul Extraction is a general mule for 5 of the aura IOs, but there is an extra Acc/Dam/Rech in there to help boost the summoned pet a bit. However, I find that unlike Hell on Earth or Gang War, the summoned pet isn't as important and thus feel okay with more muled IOs in there than perhaps in Demons (but I always mule at least 4 in any power that will take them, as I prefer steady-state improvements and IO/procs of my permanent pets over temporary buffs/pets). You could easily remove the Acc/Dam/Rech and toss that slot elsewhere, but you'd lose the 2-piece 2.5% recovery bonus, which I like. In general, I think this is a solid build. I have never run Necro/Nature together, but I do have a fully incarnated Necro/Dark MM and a fully incarnated Plant/Nature controller, so I'm familiar with the power sets. The MM personally is tough enough for dealing with casual aggro or an ambush. If you really wanted Hoarfrost or Hibernate over Afterburner/Super Speed, those would be viable alternatives. Both would be useful 'oh shoot' panic buttons. But if you ever actually go tanker-minding you'll need a very different build. NOTE: Sovereign Right and Expedient Reinforcement descriptions say +resist vs all but Psi, but in-game combat metrics show the buff does apply vs all damage. Pets with all applicable IOs and Nature / Leadership buffs are as follows: Zombie 14% Defense (All) 29% AoE Defense 78% Smashing Resists 52% Lethal Resists 52% Fire Resists 78% Cold Resists 52% Energy Resists 78% Negative Resists 78% Psionic Resists 78% Toxic Resists Grave Knight 14% Defense (All) 29% AoE Defense 52% Smashing Resists 52% Lethal Resists 52% Fire Resists 78% Cold Resists 52% Energy Resists 78% Negative Resists 78% Psionic Resists 78% Toxic Resists Lich 14% Defense (All) 29% AoE Defense 52% Smashing Resists 52% Lethal Resists 52% Fire Resists 78% Cold Resists 52% Energy Resists 78% Negative Resists 52% Psionic Resists 78% Toxic Resists With Spore Cloud up (and not factoring in EB/AV/GM debuff resists), the undead will be at an effective soft-cap vs AOE and a respectable 31% defense vs other attacks. But anything that resists the debuff or is not in range of Spore Cloud (which has a 15' radius) will hit much more often, which can punish the T1 Zombies, especially due to their lower T1 hit points. Wild Bastion can really help them manage those one-shots. Its nice to note that all of them have 100% resistance to recharge and slow movement debuffs. They also have 4.0 Fear/Sleep and 1.0 Stun protection (Lich doesn't have Stun). While you have solid, all-around resists thanks to the Pet IOs and Wild Growth, you'll note that Lethal, Fire and Energy are both common in-game and also not the strongest resists (ie,the pets don't have their own native resists to stack with this). You'll need to rely on your debuffs (Spore Cloud, Lich, GK gloom) to help counter that, as well as your Absorb in Wild Bastion, plus all the huge amounts of green numbers you can throw off with your heals. On top of that, extra mitigation exists with Entangling Aura and Lich through holds and the like will be helpful at times (plus the KD from Zombies and KU from Grave Knights). Use Flash Freeze to counter ambushes or extra groups / patrols you are not ready to fight yet. Having your Alpha get your level shift will really help this build as it does with all masterminds, to counter the purple patch. Likewise, with this build I'd go with Intuition to improve damage, hold and tohit debuff, but Musculature is also another solid option, trading out hold for EndMod and others, but personally I'd go Intuition to help improve Entangling Aura and Lich's holds on top of Damage. Because you're in melee range, I'd also be inclined to go with Void Judgement for placement and the huge -Damage debuff. Easy to lead off with that through stealth for 30 seconds of debuff. For Interface, I like Diamagnetic for the To Hit Debuff and Regen Debuff. For my first Destiny pick, I'd go Clarion. Nothing sucks more than getting mezzed and many mezzes are Energy/Psi related, which you have lower Defense. Plus it keeps the pets from being knocked/held/confused. Barrier would also be a decent choice if you don't care about mezz protection. Hybrid, I like support with double values for pets. Buffs to Defense, Damage, End Discount, and more are too good to pass up for a nice 50% uptime. Great when you hit a crunch situation or expect one. The build is below. As with anything its just my way of building it, and there are a hundred other ways to skin the same cat. Use what works for you and ditch the rest, and especially, just have fun! Comments/questions welcome.

@TK3477 since you are not tankerminding, are you committed to the Fighting pool? I don't like it on MMs otherwise, and you could easily drop it in my opinion and use those powers and slots elsewhere. I know you want soft capped S/L but IMO it's not vital if not tankerminding...but I could probably find a way to make up the S/L gap with IOs.

Thanks for the reminder. Life's been a little hectic. I'll put something out I had been putting together after breakfast this morning.

Nice build Meknomancer. Bots/Dark is definitely a classic. Like you, I've moved away from Bots because of single target damage and the long pauses at times between attacks. That said, they are solid as a pet set, just no longer top tier IMO. I do like the -regen in Big Bot, however, and it does make their single target damage vs. EB, AV and GMs pretty good as they neuter regen. Bots is definitely a 'bursty' damage for its AOE. When the fire patches spread and things die quickly, its glorious, but it is not a steady state. Kind of like Thugs' arsonist, but a whole set.

Okay, with my Beasts/Time the pets are about 40% Defense vs. Ranged/Melee and 55% with AOE. This is with Farsight (6-slotted with Red Fortune), Maneuvers and all three Defense IOs. When the Lionesses have their buff up, it goes up another 6%. So just over soft-cap. I used to have Mace Master for the power boost, which had the pets at softcap without the Lionesses, but I found it wasn't needed at all with all the -ToHit debuff, Regen and Heals. On top of that, I had Hybrid Suport for when I wanted a bit of extra defense in case Time's Juncture debuffs wasn't enough. I ended up with Leviathan for theme over Mace. Of course, if I ever want to lose the stacking damage/crit buffs I could use Fortify Pack for an extra 5 to 12 % Defense for 60 seconds duration every 90 seconds. But I never do. Honestly, my opinions of Beasts has really improved from 'pretty good' to "amazing' over the last year. Beasts have good resists, and very solid base Defense, paired with very solid ST damage. They are always where you want them to be, right in melee, close to you (if you are Time), and easily in range for heals, Farsight, Clarion, etc. Anyway, that's my Beasts/Time that is soft-capped almost all of the time (with Lioness, Hybrid and -ToHit) with stacking Pack Mentality.

You are a scholar and a person of breeding! I never knew this. Thanks! 😀😀

That would be my Beast/Time. Fortify is merely a mule for LotG. I lost all my Mid's data so I'd have to rebuild it to paste here, but I can if you'd like. It's an effective build. Fun too.

Beast/Kin is a solid pairing 🙂. But beasts are great with many secondaries.

Support for all around bonuses and ease of use

I like Call Hawk best for one single attack.

I will add a section that discusses Incarnate choices, certainly

🙂 I'll be free on Friday after my work week. I'll see what I could suggest then, if you don't mind the wait.

As an MM enthusiast, I appreciate the work to get these valuations ty 👍🏻🙂